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Thursday, August 03, 2006


Middle east, being the birth land of the three major religions in the world, has always been a battle field for clashes between followers of these three Great religions, fueled by a lot of politics, of course !.
And with all what's happening over there at the moment, its hard to think anything but war and destruction!
The British Museum in London, however, had a different view of the region, it looked at it as a land of beautiful and inspirational art.
Following an email from my Friend, Hassan, telling me about the event, I decided to give it a visit. It’s the "Word into Art: Artists of the modern middle east" exhibition at The British Museum in London.
I was first disappointed to realise that its for modern artist only ! as I was hoping to see some fine work of our old artists. And if that wasn't enough, I was asked to put my camera away !
So I have to apologise for Hassan who asked me to take some pictures.
However, before they did, I managed to take one picture, and I also bought some post cards showing the paintings.

The exhibition was not huge but very representative, I thought. I liked how Arabic alphabets were used to illustrate the simple Arabic person's thoughts, worries, dreams pleasure and religious believes.
There was a painting of Um kelthoom with the names of her famous songs, there was another with a kid holding an axe and a third of poem praising the day when snipers were having a day off !
In addition to paintings, there was some other art works, like a nailed book by tens of nails for an Egyptian artist.
Most of the art was for Iraqies artist and some Iranians and Egyptians.
The event is sponsored by Dubai holding and runs till the 3rd of September.
Although, it was a typical HOT July day in London!, It was a good day out and well worth it. I recommend it.

In summary,
The event : Word into Art: Artists of the modern Middle East
Place : British Museum in London
Period : between 18th of May and 3rd of Sep
Fees : Free
Time needed : an hour.
Ages : any age, people who can read and understand Arabic would enjoy it
more.
Scoring:
Educational : 5/10
Artistically : 9/10
Entertainment: 8/10
Overall : Good

Pictures:
































1 Comments:

At 8/03/2006 8:17 pm, Blogger flamin said...

interesting! but like u said, pity it was only modern art. the past holds a lot more richness in the middle east :)

 

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